Moe Lane

I’ll be hitting this story about possible legal shenanigans involving Senator Olympia Snowe tomorrow – it’s a bit late to work on it now – but let me note this: if it’s true then I’m hearing that it may be awful news for a certain Member of Congress whose own spouse’s financial activities might not stand up under any kind of similar scrutiny.

Annnnnd that’s all I’m going to write until I have more information.

At least, that’s how it looks from this Politico article.  It’s at the point where Snowe is openly feuding with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (much to the pleased bemusement of Senate Republicans):

It started in 2009, when Snowe lamented being shut out of Democratic negotiations over the health care bill, continued as Reid bashed her in a 2010 magazine interview and culminated in recent weeks when the two engaged in a rare public spat on the Senate floor.

The two sparred over a noncontroversial small-business reauthorization bill, with Reid accusing Snowe of “killing” the bill and Snowe saying Reid reneged on a promise to bring up her amendment.

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Honestly, I’m hearing as many different reasons for Senator Snowe’s yes vote in committee yesterday as there are people makng them, ranging from the apologetic to the apoplectic – and a couple that were Armageddonic, if that’s even a word.  But one thing is becoming apparent: moving the ball, it is not.  There are a bunch of illustrative sections in this Politico article, so here’s one more or less at random:

In this environment, few uncommitted Democrats were willing to make any new commitments on Wednesday. And no one thought Snowe’s vote would break the logjam.

“It didn’t change anything for me,” Pryor said.

[snip]

“We just finished the first quarter,” Nelson said. “There are three quarters to play. The bench is worn out. The quarterback keeps getting sacked. And the crowd has about had it, too.”

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